Coloratura
Coloratura is an elaborate
Coloratura is particularly found in vocal music and especially in operatic singing of the 18th and 19th centuries. The word coloratura (UK: /ˌkɒlərəˈtjʊərə/ COL-ə-rə-TURE-ə, US: /ˌkʌl-/ CUL-, Italian: [koloraˈtuːra]) means "coloring" in Italian, and derives from the Latin word colorare ("to color").[1]
History
The term coloratura was first defined in several early non-Italian music dictionaries: Michael Praetorius's Syntagma musicum (1618); Sébastien de Brossard's Dictionaire de musique (1703); and Johann Gottfried Walther's Musicalisches Lexicon (1732). In these early texts "the term is dealt with briefly and always with reference to Italian usage".[4]
Christoph Bernhard (1628–1692) defined coloratura in two ways:[4]
- cadenza: "runs which are not so exactly bound to the bar, but which often extend two, three or more bars further [and] should be made only at chief closes" (Von der Singe-Kunst, oder Maniera, c. 1649)
- diminution: "when an interval is altered through several shorter notes, so that, instead of one long note, a number of shorter ones rush to the next note through all kinds of progressions by step or leap" (Tractatus compositionis, c. 1657)
The term was never used in the most famous Italian texts on singing:
Modern usage
The term coloratura is most commonly applied to the elaborate and florid figuration or ornamentation in
Despite its derivation from Latin colorare ("to color"), the term does not apply to the practice of "coloring" the voice, i.e. altering the quality or timbre of the voice for expressive purposes (for example, the technique of voix sombrée used by Gilbert Duprez in the 1830s).[4]
Vocal ranges
The term is not restricted to describing any one range of voice. All female and male voice types may achieve mastery of coloratura technique. There are coloratura parts for all voice types in different musical genres.[3]
Nevertheless, the term coloratura, when used without further qualification, normally means soprano di coloratura. A coloratura soprano role, most famously typified by the Queen of the Night in Mozart's The Magic Flute,[5] has a high range and requires the singer to execute with great facility elaborate ornamentation and embellishment, including running passages, staccati, and trills. A coloratura soprano has the vocal ability to produce notes above high C (C6) and possesses a tessitura ranging from A4 to A5 or higher (unlike lower sopranos whose tessitura is G4–G5 or lower).[citation needed]
Richard Miller names two types of soprano coloratura voices (the coloratura and the dramatic coloratura)[6] as well as a mezzo-soprano coloratura voice,[7] and although he does not mention the coloratura contralto, he includes mention of specific works requiring coloratura technique for the contralto voice.[8]
Examples of coloratura music for different voice ranges include:
- Mozart's Allelujah (from Exsultate, jubilate) may be arranged for and sung by a properly trained contralto, mezzo-soprano or soprano. The piece was written for soprano castrato.
- The aria Every valley shall be exalted from Handel's Messiah is an example of a coloratura piece for tenor.
- Each singer of a major role in Rossini's operas must have a secure coloratura technique[citation needed].
- Osmin, a character in Mozart's The Abduction from the Seraglio, is a coloratura role for a basso.
- Agitata da due venti ("Agitated by two winds") a coloratura soprano aria, from Antonio Vivaldi's opera Griselda.
- Naqui All'Affanno - Non Piu Mesta a coloratura contralto rondo, from Rossini's opera La Cenerentola.
See also
Citations
Works cited
- Apel, Willi, ed. (1969). ISBN 978-0-674-37501-7.
- Miller, Richard (2000). Training soprano voices. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-513018-8.
- Randel, Don Michael, ed.; Apel, Willi, ed. (1986). New Harvard Dictionary of Music. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-61525-0.
- Sadie, Stanley, ed. (1992). ISBN 978-1-56159-228-9.